As expected Verdania took him on another trip, this time to a mountain range. Ciaran had seen mountains before but never ones that crossed the clouds less than halfway up. It was a majestic sight, but the boy felt nothing but fear.
The mountain itself was a death trap, but its inhabitants were even more dangerous. From birds of prey to mountain lions, there were many things that would endanger his life here.
"As you can see, this would be slightly more challenging for you than last time. First, let me warn you, this is a level Five Zone. Meaning that the strongest creature here is Rank Five, and this time I will not warn them off you. You need to learn how to be stealthy as well."
The boy looked at her, fear still in his eyes. If that was all she wanted, it would be too easy. Sure the predators in this God-forsaken place would kill him with a little more than a look, but with Ariadne by his side, survival was more than possible. They just had to hide and hunt the weaker creatures.
"I know that look, Ciaran, but don't you worry, your Big Sis will not make it boring for you." She said with a kind smile on her face.
'Oh, we are so fucked.' All the color had drained from his face, and deep within his soul, Ariadne had covered all her eyes with her legs.
"Naturally survival is your main task, but this time there is more. Your first bonus task is to collect feathers from forty unique birds. Don't worry there are hundreds of species here, I am sure you will manage."
"Second bonus task is you have to collect the horns of a mountain goat. That's it. Do that and your Water training begins next year. Fail and you get nothing." She said as she gave him a kiss on the forehead for good luck.
She then teleported away and left the boy looking at the huge pile of rocks that would be his home for the next three months. He was just about to set off when Verdania returned, startling the boy.
"I forgot, there is one more thing. If you make it to the top I will convince Eleftherios to start your weapon lessons early. Do not attempt it, you will die. I am serious Ciaran, past the halfway point Rank Threes start to show up. You attempt to go up past there, you aren't risking your life, you are throwing it away." She said and with no further explanation, she vanished.
'The carrot and the stick method is it? Why not just tell me not to go past some point if you didn't want me to attempt it?' The boy thought and sighted.
He began his ascend by walking up a road. It was long and wide, meant for things much bigger than himself. The boy disliked how open he was on this road, but the alternative was to climb the mountain barehanded, which for all intense and purposes, was stupid.
It wasn't long before the first danger appeared in front of him, a small Rank One fox. It was as big as a big dog but it was small for its Rank.
"Don't help me if I don't need it Ari I want to test myself."
And the boy went towards it. It eyed him up. It was wondering why the child was rushing to die, but it didn't think for long before it pounced.
It was fast, really fast. Ciaran didn't even have time to react before its teeth were a few millimeters away from his thought. Before it could bite him though Ariadne materialized and pushed the boy away and bite the fox herself.
Ariadne was venomous and her venom was nothing to sneer at. The fox got away from her but before it could launch a counterattack or run away it was paralyzed. Then it was just a matter of a leg to the head before the spider claimed her first victim in the mountains.
The boy was glad they were alright, but his pride was more than a little bruised. He had miscalculated. He thought he was capable to fight above his Rank, just because they had done so before. But they never fought straight on, traps and trickery were involved before.
"We are hunters, I know this Ariadne, but I wanted to see if I could take a damn fox in a fight. Turns out I can't even do that. Big Bro would be disappointed in me." The boy was dejected. He had trained like a madman with Eleftherios for more than a year, almost two years actually, and he was still nothing compared to the weakest things the mountain could trough at him.
"Fine, lesson learned. No more straight-on fights, from now on we fight only on our terms. Ari let's first tackle the forest up ahead. When we feel ready, we move on up. Thoughts?" The boy asked, and the spider nudged him forward to lead.
She could feel he wasn't too sad about the loss but he was still salty about it. She thought a few hunts would cheer him on, and so she encouraged him to lead her into them.
Boy and spider walked to the forest, which was much smaller than the last one they were in. Not tropical, and the humidity was low. But the danger within it could be felt all the same.
"Let's move out of the road. Let me on, we are moving via trees." He said as he got on the spider's back. She was a giant spider, but a spider nonetheless. When she moved she produced no sound. Ciaran had learned how to stick to her body so when they stayed in the shadows, their presence vanished, they were essentially untraceable.
She was also of the Water body type, and Verdania had taught her a neat little trick, how to erase not only her smell but also Ciaran's when he was riding her. It wouldn't work against something with high perception in the Second Rank, but it was more than enough to scout the forest.
They spent five hours, but in the end, they scouted the whole perimeter. In the forest, the most dangerous thing was a pack of wolves. Big ferocious and a whole three dozen of them. All of them are at Rank One.
'They could probably take on a few Rank Twos if they were willing to suffer some losses.'
The other things they had to watch out for were the birds. At first, Ciaran was pleasantly surprised, there were more than forty species of birds in this forest alone. All they had to do was hunt them down, and the first thing on the list could be crossed out.
They soon found out that it wasn't so easy. In the first few days, they hunted a few varieties of Wild Turkeys. The birds were fast and loud, and they were able to attract other, stronger creatures, but all that achieved, was that the duo could not claim the carcasses, and they had to once again hunt for food.
Over the course of a week, they perfected their craft. Now nothing in the forest was safe from them. The birds that could fly were tricky, they set up thin invisible-to-the-eye treads of spider webs and sliced them up mid-flight.
Predicting the flight path of something that moved as fast as the wind was hard, to say the least. But coating the web in a way that made it stay invisible to even Rank One birds, now that was the truly hard part.
By the end of the week, they had hunted a few Owls, some Robins, Hermit Thrushes, Bluebirds, Hawks, Emperien Goldfinches, Chickadees, and the ones they hated the most Woodpeckers. They were a menace to the duo because Ciaran decided they would live in the trees.
The trees of this forest were massive. They were more than enough for even Ariadne to move inside should the need arise. They found a nice little drey in one of them, and it was even fortified as well. The previous owner was kind enough to furnish their temporary home, so they treated him to a nice warm bath. Ciaran handed eaten boiled squirrel before, and he really didn't want to try it again anytime soon.
"I like bird meat better, how about you Ari?" He asked her.
The spider wasn't picky about her food, so she just shrugged it off. They used the squirrel nest for four days before a few of those home wreckers came and drilled holes in their perfect hideout. They gave Ciaran the scare of his life so he had Ariadne wrap them in spider webs, and then set them on fire. Plenty of flammable things one could find in a forest, especially for the vengeful little pyromaniac.
By the start of week two they had collected thirty-two feathers, and there were still a few more birds they could try, but Ciaran opted out of that. There were only Ravens left, and those things tended to hold a grudge as hard as he himself did.
The boy didn't want to leave the feathers uncollected though, so he decided to just ask. He already knew they could understand him, so he opted to make a deal with them.
The Ravens didn't ask for much, some even straight-up gave him one of their fallen feathers. Some asked for help from Ariadne in securing their nest with traps, and some asked for help in securing food.
"I love dealing with intelligent creatures. If those fools in my class were one-tenth as pleasant to deal with, maybe I wouldn't mind coexisting with them so much. Hey, do you think I can get a second familiar, it would be nice to have a Raven on the team. A pair of wings would do us nicely." He joked, and Ariadne protested.
She argued that she was more than enough for him. He didn't know spiders could pout, but it sure as hell was an amusing sight.